shakingly feeble, that I can hardly hold my pen any further then to
tell you, I am yours {106} while I live, which I believe will be but
some few minutes.
If this Letter come to you before I’me dead, pray for me, but if I am
gone, pray howsoever, for they can do me no harm if they come after me.
_Vale._
_Your real Friend_,
G. A.
From _Mary-Land_, Dec. 13. _Anno_
_To my Parents._
From the Grave or Receptacle of Death am I raised, and by an omnipotent
power made capable of offering once more my Obedience (that lies close
cabbined in the inwardmost apartment of my Soul) at the feet of your
immutable Loves.
My good Parents, God hath done marvellous things for me, far beyond
my deserts, which at best were preposterously sinful, and unsuitable
to the sacred will of an Almighty: _But he is merciful, and his mercy
endures for ever._ When sinful man has by his Evils and Iniquities
pull’d some penetrating Judgment upon his head, and finding himself
immediately not able to stand under so great a burthen as Gods smallest
stroke of Justice, lowers the Top-gallant sayle of his Pride, and
with an humble submissiveness prostrates himself before the Throne
of his sacred Mercy, and {107} like those three Lepars that sate at
the Gate of _Samaria_, resolved, _If we go into the City we shall
perish, and if we stay here we shall perish also: Therefore we will
throw our selves into the hands of the_ Assyrians _and if we perish,
we perish_: This was just my condition as to eternal state; my soul
was at a stand in this black storm of affliction: I view’d the World,
and all that’s pleasure in her, and found her altogether flashy,
aiery, and full of notional pretensions, and not one firm place where
a distressed Soul could hang his trust on. Next I viewed my self, and
there I found, instead of good Works, lively Faith, and Charity, a
most horrid neast of condemned Evils, bearing a supreme Prerogative
over my internal faculties. You’l say here was little hope of rest in
this extreme Eclipse, being in a desperate amaze to see my estate so
deplorable: My better Angel urged me to deliver up my aggrievances to
the Bench of Gods Mercy, the sure support of all distressed Souls: His
Heavenly warning, and inward whispers of the good Spirit I was resolv’d
to entertain, and not quench, and throw my self into the armes of a
loving God, _If I perish, I perish_. ’Tis beyond wonder to think of the
love of God extended to sinful man, that in the deepest distresses or
agonies of Affliction, when all other things prove rather hinderances
then advantages, even at that time God is ready and steps forth to the
supportment of his drooping Spirit. Truly, about a fortnight before I
wrote this Letter, two of our ablest Physicians {108} rendered me up
into the hands of God, the universal Doctor of the whole World, and
subscribed with a silent acknowledgement, That all their Arts, screw’d
up to the very Zenith of Scholastique perfection, were not capable of
keeping me from the Grave at that time: But God, the great preserver
of Soul and Body, said contrary to the expectation of humane reason,
_Arise, take up thy bed and walk_.
I am now (through the help of my Maker) creeping up to my former
strength and vigour, and every day I live, I hope I shall, through the
assistance of divine Grace, climbe nearer and nearer to my eternal home.
I have received this year three Letters from you, one by Capt. _Conway_
Commander of the _Wheat-Sheaf_, the others by a _Bristol_ Ship. Having
no more at present to trouble you with, but expecting your promise, I
remain as ever,
_Your dutiful Son_,
G. A.
_Mary-Land_, _April_ 9. _Anno_
I desire my hearty love may be remembered to my Brother, and the rest
of my Kinred.
FINIS.
{109}
NOTES.
_Note_ 1, _page_ 15.
After having resolved to reprint Alsop’s early account of Maryland,
as an addition to my _Bibliotheca Americana_, I immediately fell in
with a difficulty which I had not counted on. After much inquiry and
investigation, I could find no copy to print from among all my earnest
book collecting acquaintances. At length some one informed me that
Mr. Bancroft the historian had a copy in his library. I immediately
took the liberty of calling on him and making known my wants, he
generously offered to let me have the use of it for the purpose stated,
I carried the book home, had it carefully copied, but unfortunately
during the process I discovered the text was imperfect as well as
deficient in both portrait and map. Like Sisyphus I had to begin
anew, and do nearly all my labor over; I sent to London to learn if
the functionaries in the British Museum would permit a tracing of the
portrait and map to be made from their copy, the answer returned was,
that they would or could not permit this, but I might perfect my text
if I so choosed by copying from theirs. Here I was once more at sea
without compass, rudder, or chart: I made known my condition to an
eminent and judicious collector of old American literature in the city
of New York, he very frankly informed me that he could aid me in my
difficulty by letting me have the use of a copy, which would relieve
me from my present dilemma. I was greatly rejoiced at this discovery
as well as by the generosity of the owner. The following day the
book was put into my possession, and so by the aid of it was enabled
to complete the text. Here another difficulty burst into view, this
copy had no portrait. That being the only defect in perfecting a copy
of Alsop’s book, I now resolved to proceed and publish it without a
portrait, but perhaps fortunately, making known this resolve to some
of the knowing ones in book gathering, they remonstrated against this
course, adding that it would ruin the book in the estimation of all
who would buy such a rarity. I was inclined to listen favorably to
this protest, and therefore had to commence a new effort to obtain a
portrait. I then laid about me again to try and procure a copy that
had one: I knew that not more than three or four collectors in the
country who were likely to have such an heir-loom. To one living at a
considerable distance from New York I took the liberty of addressing
a letter on the subject, wherein I made known my difficulties. To my
great gratification this courteous and confiding gentleman not only
immediately made answer, but sent a perfect copy of this rare and much
wanted book for my use. I immediately had the {110} portrait and map
reproduced by the photo-lithographic process. During the time the book
was in my possession, which was about ten days, so fearful was I that
any harm should befall it that I took the precaution to wrap up the
precious little volume in tissue paper and carry it about with me all
the time in my side pocket, well knowing that if it was either injured
or lost I could not replace it. I understand that a perfect copy of the
original in the London market would bring fifty pounds sterling. I had
the satisfaction to learn it reached the generous owner in safety.
Had I known the difficulties I had to encounter of procuring a copy of
the original of Alsop’s singular performance, I most certainly would
never have undertaken to reproduce it in America. Mr. Jared Sparks told
me that he had a like difficulty to encounter when he undertook to
write the life of Ledyard the traveler. Said he: “a copy of his journal
I could find nowhere to purchase, at length I was compelled to borrow
a copy on very humiliating conditions; the owner perhaps valued it too
highly.” I may add that I had nearly as much difficulty in securing an
editor, as I had in procuring a perfect copy. However on this point I
at last was very fortunate.
WILLIAM GOWANS.
115 Nassau street, March 23d, 1869.
_Note_ 2, _page_ 19.
Cecilius, Lord Baltimore, eldest son of George Calvert, 1st Lord
Baltimore, and Anne Wynne of Hertingfordbury, England, was born in
1606. He succeeded to the title April 15, 1632, and married Anne,
daughter of Lord Arundel, whose name was given to a county in Maryland.
His rule over Maryland, disturbed in Cromwell’s time, but restored
under Charles II, has always been extolled. He died Nov. 30, 1675,
covered with age and reputation.—_O’Callaghan’s N. Y. Col. Doc._, II.
p. 74.
_Note_ 3, _page_ 19.
Avalon, the territory in Newfoundland, of which the first Lord
Baltimore obtained a grant in 1623, derived its name from the spot in
England where, as tradition said, Christianity was first preached by
Joseph of Arimathea.
_Note_ 4, _page_ 21.
Owen Feltham, as our author in his errata correctly gives the name, was
an author who enjoyed a great reputation in his day. His _Resolves_
appeared first about 1620, and in 1696 had reached the eleventh
edition. They were once reprinted in the 18th century, and in full
or in part four times in the {111} 19th, and an edition appeared
in America about 1830. Hallam in spite of this popularity calls him
“labored, artificial and shallow.”
_Note_ 5, _page_ 24.
Burning on the hand was not so much a punishment as a mark on those
who, convicted of felony, pleaded the benefit of clergy, which they
were allowed to do once only.
_Note_ 6, _page_ 25.
Literally: “Good wine needs no sign.”
_Note_ 7, _page_ 26.
Billingsgate is the great fish market of London, and the scurrilous
tongues of the fish women have made the word synonymous with vulgar
abuse.
_Note_ 8, _page_ 28.
Alsop though cautiously avoiding Maryland politics, omits no fling at
the Puritans. Pride was a parliament colonel famous for _Pride’s Purge_.
_Notes_ 9, 10, _pages_ 31, 33.
William Bogherst, and H. W., Master of Arts, have eluded all our
efforts to immortalize them.
_Note_ 11, _page_ 35.
Chesapeake is said to be K’tchisipik, Great Water, in Algonquin.
_Note_ 12, _page_ 38.
Less bombast and some details as to the botany of Maryland would have
been preferable.
_Note_ 13, _page_ 39.
The American deer (_Cariacus Virginianus_) is here evidently meant.
{112}
_Note_ 14, _page_ 39.
Whetston’s (Whetstone) park: “A dilapidated street in Lincoln’s Inn
Fields, at the back of Holborn. It contains scarcely anything but
old, half-tumble down houses; not a living plant of any kind adorns
its nakedness, so it is presumable that as a park it never had an
existence, or one so remote that even tradition has lost sight of the
fact.”
_Note_ 15, _page_ 39.
The animals here mentioned are the black wolf (_canis occidentalis_),
the black bear, the panther (_felis concolor_).
_Note_ 16, _page_ 40.
These animals are well known, the elk (_alces Americanus_), cat o’ the
mountain or catamount (_felis concolor_), raccoon (_procyon lotor_),
fox (_vulpes fulvus_), beaver (_castor fiber_), otter (_lutra_),
opossum (_didelphys Virginiana_), hare, squirrel, musk-rat (_fiber
zibethicus_). The monack is apparently the Maryland marmot or woodchuck
(_arctomys monax_).
_Note_ 17, _page_ 40.
The domestic animals came chiefly from Virginia. As early as May 27,
1634, they got 100 swine from Accomac, with 30 cows, and they expected
goats and hens (_Relation of Maryland_, 1634). Horses and sheep had
to be imported from England, Virginia being unable to give any. Yet
in 1679 Dankers and Sluyters, the Labadists, say: “Sheep they have
none.”—_Collections Long Island Hist. Soc._, I, p. 218.
_Note_ 18, _page_ 41.
Alluding to the herds of swine kept by the Gadarenes, into one of which
the Saviour allowed the devil named Legion to enter.
_Note_ 19, _page_ 42.
The abundance of these birds is mentioned in the _Relations of
Maryland_, 1634, p. 22, and 1635, p. 23. The Labadists with whose
travels the Hon. {113} H. C. Murphy has enriched our literature,
found the geese in 1679–80 so plentiful and noisy as to prevent their
sleeping, and the ducks filling the sky like a cloud.—_Long Island
Hist. Coll._, I, pp. 195, 204.
_Note_ 20, _page_ 43.
Alsop makes no allusion to the cultivation of maize, yet the Labadists
less than twenty years after describe it at length as the principal
grain crop of Maryland.—_Ib._, p. 216.
_Note_ 21, _page_ 45.
Considering the facts of history, this picture is sadly overdrawn,
Maryland having had its full share of civil war.
_Note_ 22, _page_ 46.
The fifth monarchy men were a set of religionists who arose during the
Puritan rule in England. They believed in a fifth universal monarchy of
which Christ was to be the head, under whom they, his saints, were to
possess the earth. In 1660 they caused an outbreak in London, in which
many were killed and others tried and executed. Their leader was one
Venner. The Adamites, a gnostic sect, who pretended that regenerated
man should go naked like Adam and Eve in their state of innocence,
were revived during the Puritan rule in England; and in our time in
December, 1867, we have seen the same theory held and practiced in
Newark, N. J.
_Note_ 23, _page_ 46.
In the provisional act, passed in the first assembly, March 19, 1638,
and entitled “An Act ordaining certain laws for the government of this
province,” the twelfth section required that “every person planting
tobacco shall plant and tend two acres of corn.” A special act was
introduced the same session and read twice, but not passed. A new
law was passed, however, Oct. 23, 1640, renewed Aug. 1, 1642, April
21, 1649, Oct. 20, 1654, April 12, 1662, and made perpetual in 1676.
These acts imposed a fine of fifty pounds of tobacco for every half
acre the offender fell short, besides fifty pounds of the same current
leaf as constables’ fees. It was to this persistent enforcement of the
cultivation of cereals that Maryland so soon became the granary of New
England. {114}
_Note_ 24, _page_ 47.
The Assembly, or House of Burgesses, at first consisted of all freemen,
but they gradually gave place to delegates. The influence of the
proprietary, however, decided the selection. In 1650 fourteen burgesses
met as delegates or representatives of the several hundreds, there
being but two counties organized, St. Marys and the Isle of Kent. Ann
Arundel, called at times Providence county, was erected April 29,
1650. Patuxent was erected under Cromwell in 1654.—_Bacon’s Laws of
Maryland_, 1765.
_Note_ 25, _page_ 47.
Things had changed when the _Sot Weed Factor_ appeared, as the author
of that satirical poem dilates on the litigious character of the people.
_Note_ 26, _page_ 47.
The allusion here I have been unable to discover.
_Note_ 27, _page_ 48.
The colony seems to have justified some of this eulogy by its good
order, which is the more remarkable, considering the height of party
feeling.
_Note_ 28, _page_ 48.
Halberdeers; the halberd was smaller than the partisan, with a sharp
pointed blade, with a point on one side like a pole-axe.
_Note_ 29, _page_ 49.
Newgate, Ludgate and Bridewell are the well known London prisons.
_Note_ 30, _page_ 50.
Our author evidently failed from this cause. {115}
_Note_ 31, _page_ 50.
A fling at the various Puritan schools, then active at home and abroad.
_Note_ 32, _page_ 50.
The first Quakers in Maryland were Elizabeth Harris, Josiah Cole, and
Thomas Thurston, who visited it in 1657, but as early as July 23, 1659,
the governor and council issued an order to seize any Quakers and whip
them from constable to constable out of the province. Yet in spite of
this they had settled meetings as early as 1661, and Peter Sharpe, the
Quaker physician, appears as a landholder in 1665, the very year of
Alsop’s publication.—_Norris, Early Friends or Quakers in Maryland_
(Maryland Hist. Soc., March, 1862).
_Note_ 33, _page_ 50.
The Baptists centering in Rhode Island, extended across Long Island
to New Jersey, and thence to New York city; but at this time had not
reached the south.
_Note_ 34, _page_ 56.
A copy of the usual articles is given in the introduction. Alsop here
refutes current charges against the Marylanders for their treatment
of servants. Hammond, in his _Leah and Rachel_, p. 12, says: “The
labour servants are put to is not so hard, nor of such continuance as
husbandmen nor handecraftmen are kept at in England. . . . . The women
are not (as is reported) put into the ground to worke, but occupie such
domestic imployments and housewifery as in England.”
_Note_ 35, _page_ 59.
Laws as to the treatment of servants were passed in the Provisional act
of 1638, and at many subsequent assemblies.
_Notes_ 36, 37, _pages_ 59, 61.
Lewknors lane or Charles street was in Drury lane, in the parish of St.
Giles.—_Seymour’s History of London_, II, p. 767. Finsbury is still a
well known quarter, in St. Luke’s parish, Middlesex. {116}
_Note_ 38, _page_ 65.
Nicholas Culpepper, “student in physic and astrology,” whose _English
Physician_, published in 1652, ran through many editions, and is still
a book published and sold.
_Note_ 39, _page_ 65.
Dogs dung, used in dressing morocco, is euphemized into _album græcum_,
and is also called _pure_; those who gather it being still styled in
England pure-finders.—_Mayhew, London Labor and London Poor_, II, p.
158.
_Note_ 40, _page_ 65.
He has not mentioned tobacco as a crop, but describes it fully a few
pages after. In Maryland as in Virginia it was the currency. Thus
in 1638 an act authorized the erection of a water-mill to supersede
hand-mills for grinding grain, and the cost was limited to 20,000 lbs.
of tobacco.—_McSherry’s History of Maryland_, p. 56. The Labadists in
their _Travels_ (p. 216) describe the cultivation at length. Tobacco at
this time paid two shillings English a cask export duty in Maryland,
and two-pence a pound duty on its arrival in England, besides weighing
and other fees.
_Note_ 41, _page_ 66.
The Parson of Pancras is unknown to me: but the class he represents is
certainly large.
_Note_ 42, _page_ 66.
The buffalo was not mentioned in the former list, and cannot be
considered as synonymous with elk.
_Note_ 43, _page_ 67.
For satisfactory and correct information of the present commerce and
condition of Maryland, the reader is referred to the _Census of the
United States_ in 4 vols., 4to, published at Washington, 1865. {117}
_Note_ 44, _page_ 69.
This is a curious observation as to New England trade. A century
later Hutchinson represents Massachusetts as receiving Maryland
flour from the Pennsylvania mills, and paying in money and bills of
exchange.—_Hist. of Massachusetts_, p. II, 397.
_Note_ 45, _page_ 69.
The trade with Barbadoes, now insignificant, was in our colonial times
of great importance to all the colonies. Barbadoes is densely peopled
and thoroughly cultivated; its imports and exports are each about five
millions of dollars annually.
_Note_ 46, _page_ 71.
The Susquehannas. This _Relation_ is one of the most valuable
portions of Alsop’s tract, as no other Maryland document gives as
much concerning this tribe, which nevertheless figures extensively in
Maryland annals. Dutch and Swedish writers speak of a tribe called
Minquas (Minquosy, Machœretini in _De Laet_, p. 76); the French in
Canada (_Champlain_, the _Jesuit Relations, Gendron, Particularitez
du Pays des Hurons_, p. 7, etc.), make frequent allusion to the
Gandastogués (more briefly Andastés), a tribe friendly to their
allies the Hurons, and sturdy enemies of the Iroquois; later still
Pennsylvania writers speak of the Conestogas, the tribe to which Logan
belonged, and the tribe which perished at the hands of the Paxton boys.
Although Gallatin in his map, followed by Bancroft, placed the Andastés
near Lake Erie, my researches led me to correct this, and identify the
Susquehannas, Minqua, Andastés or Gandastogués and Conestogas as being
all the same tribe, the first name being apparently an appellation
given them by the Virginia tribes; the second that given them by
the Algonquins on the Delaware; while Gandastogué as the French, or
Conestoga as the English wrote it, was their own tribal name, meaning
cabin-pole men, _Natio Perticarum_, from Andasta, a cabin-pole (map in
Creuxius, _Historia Canadensis_). I forwarded a paper on the subject
to Mr. Schoolcraft, for insertion in the government work issuing under
his supervision. It was inserted in the last volume without my name,
and ostensibly as Mr. Schoolcraft’s. I then gave it with my name in the
_Historical Magazine_, vol. II, p. 294. The result arrived at there has
been accepted by Bancroft, in his large paper edition, by Parkman, in
his _Jesuits in the Wilderness_, by Dr. O’Callaghan, S. F. Streeter,
Esq., of the Maryland Historical Society, and students generally. {118}
From the Virginian, Dutch, Swedish and French authorities, we can thus
give their history briefly.
The territory now called Canada, and most of the northern portion
of the United States, from Lake Superior and the Mississippi to the
mouth of the St. Lawrence and Chesapeake bay were, when discovered
by Europeans, occupied by two families of tribes, the Algonquin and
the Huron Iroquois. The former which included all the New England
tribes, the Micmacs, Mohegans, Delawares, Illinois, Chippewas, Ottawas,
Pottawatamies, Sacs, Foxes, Miamis, and many of the Maryland and
Virginian tribes surrounded the more powerful and civilized tribes
who have been called Huron Iroquois, from the names of the two most
powerful nations of the group, the Hurons or Wyandots of Upper Canada,
and the Iroquois or Five Nations of New York. Besides these the
group included the Neuters on the Niagara, the Dinondadies in Upper
Canada, the Eries south of the lake of that name, the Andastogués or
Susquehannas on that river, the Nottaways and some other Virginian
tribes, and finally the Tuscaroras in North Carolina and perhaps the
Cherokees, whose language presents many striking points of similarity.
Both these groups of tribes claimed a western origin, and seem, in
their progress east, to have driven out of Ohio the Quappas, called by
the Algonquins, Alkansas or Allegewi, who retreated down the Ohio and
Mississippi to the district which has preserved the name given them by
the Algonquins.
After planting themselves on the Atlantic border, the various tribes
seem to have soon divided and become embroiled in war. The Iroquois,
at first inferior to the Algonquins were driven out of the valley
of the St. Lawrence into the lake region of New York, where by
greater cultivation, valor and union they soon became superior to the
Algonquins of Canada and New York, as the Susquehannas who settled
on the Susquehanna did over the tribes in New Jersey, Maryland and
Virginia. (_Du Ponceau’s Campanius_, p. 158.) Prior to 1600 the
Susquehannas and the Mohawks, the most eastern Iroquois tribe, came
into collision, and the Susquehannas nearly exterminated the Mohawks in
a war which lasted ten years. (_Relation de la Nouv. France_, 1659–60,
p. 28.)
In 1608 Captain Smith, in exploring the Chesapeake and its tributaries,
met a party of sixty of these Sasquesahanocks as he calls them (I, p.
120–1), and he states that they were still at war with the Massawomekes
or Mohawks. (_De Laet Novus Orbis_, p. 79.)
DeVries, in his _Voyages_ (Murphy’s translation, p. 41–3), found
them in 1633 at war with the Armewamen and Sankiekans, Algonquin
tribes on the Delaware, maintaining their supremacy by butchery. They
were friendly to the Dutch. When the Swedes in 1638 settled on the
Delaware, they renewed the friendly intercourse begun by the Dutch.
They purchased lands of the ruling tribe and thus secured their
friendship. (_Hazard’s Annals_, p. 48). They carried the terror of
their arms southward also, and {119} in 1634 to 1644 they waged war
on the Yaomacoes, the Piscataways and Patuxents (_Bozman’s Maryland_,
II. p. 161), and were so troublesome that in 1642 Governor Calvert, by
proclamation, declared them public enemies.